Richard Running
Richard loved running barefoot on the beach, just at the edge of the water, where he kicked up wet sand that dried on the backs of his calves and he would rinse off later in the walk-in shower.
He was usually up early enough to watch the sun rise out of the Atlantic as he ran.
This morning that happened at low tide, which put Richard as far away from the cluster of buildings that made up the Waves Beachside Retirement Community as he could get without leaving the property.
There were a few other runners at the Waves, and on most mornings he passed one or two on his way up or down the beach, but today, aside from a beachcomber and his unleashed but lethargic dog, Richard saw no one.
After spending the past decade dodging other people on busy sidewalks or in crowded parks, he felt like he had discovered running all over again.
He did not, like some of the other runners he had observed, carry his phone with him when he ran.
He didn’t listen to podcasts or to the music of his youth, nor did he care about timing himself or calculating his pace.
He simply ran to the end of the beach and back, a distance which, if pressed, he would guess was about three miles.
But Richard didn’t run for the miles or the pace or the time plugged into some audio program.
He ran to feel the sand beneath his feet and the damp sea air in his lungs and to feel the first rays of the morning sun on his face.
When he finished showering and dressing, he picked up his phone and saw he had four missed calls.
His ringer had been silenced for at least the past couple of days.
It was just luck, he thought, that he had picked it up at all.
He rarely made or received calls. Richard had no children, no siblings, and, after losing Harry, no close friends.
He did not object to being a loner, but he had little use for the cell phone that was required of all Waves residents.
His encrypted messages to and from certain members of the Paradox Club came via an email server that he usually accessed with a laptop computer.
His phone sometimes sat for days unnoticed.
He had lately been using it as a paperweight to protect a few unpaid bills from the breeze that wafted in off the sea through the patio’s sliding glass door.
Only because he decided to pay those bills had he reached for his phone.
“Tess is back,” said Vivian without preamble.
“And hello to you, too, Vivian. What do you mean Tess is back?”
“She showed up on my doorstep yesterday afternoon. She’s taking a break from school because of, I don’t know, mental stress or something.”
Richard felt his pulse quicken. His fantasy of a quiet life by the beach and the pool seemed in danger of evaporating. “And she just happened to show up on your doorstep a week before—”
“Maybe it’s a coincidence.”
“If it’s a coincidence, it’s an awfully inconvenient one,” said Richard.
“She did say she felt pulled to the island.”
“Damn,” said Richard.
“Maybe it’s time to tell her,” said Vivian.
“You want to tell a person with fragile mental health…you want to tell her that?”
“She’s got to find out sooner or later.”
“Let’s just get through the fourteenth, Vivian.”
“Richard, you don’t think that maybe we should…”
“Don’t even say it.”
“Why not? It may be her one chance.”
“You know what happened last time,” said Richard.
“I feel like I’m all on my own here—if anything should happen. If anyone at the club were to find out—”
“I’ve got eyes in the club. If anyone finds out, I’ll know.”
“Yes, but you’ll still be a thousand miles away. Couldn’t you come stay here until after the fourteenth?”
“If we’re trying not to draw attention to your house, having me show up is the worst thing we could do.”
“Somewhere nearby, then. Shack up in a cheap motel out by the highway.”
“You realize I’m sitting on my private veranda looking out over the ocean.”
“Please, Richard. I’m not sure I can handle her.”
“What’s to handle? Just tell her stories. That always works on her.”
“I can’t just tell stories, Richard, you know that. I have to experience them.”
“I would have thought, if Harry’s math was right, you’d be experiencing them constantly these days.”
“Okay, fine. I’ll tell her stories. But I’d still feel a lot better if you were closer.”
“How about this: Remember that resort up near Sheboygan where Harry and Marie went for their tenth anniversary?”
“I remember.”
“How about I migrate up there until after the fourteenth? Keeps me out of the way, but I’m only a couple of hours away if anything happens. And I’ll have a view of a lake instead of a truck stop.”
“Would you, Richard? I’d feel so much safer knowing you were nearby.”
“I’ll fly up this afternoon. I’ll call you when I get there.”
Richard assumed Pilgrim 3 was having him watched, and he knew she wouldn’t dare risk sending tails who were not members of the Paradox Club, so he had no trouble spotting the two men assigned to follow him as soon as he was in the ticket line at the airport.
He played the old man character for all he was worth—hobbling through the cavernous ticket hall on his cane, telling the agent he needed a ticket to Los Angeles in a voice loud enough to be heard not just by the men ten feet behind him but by everyone else in the vicinity.
He lingered near the ticket desk long enough to hear the two men buy tickets to LA before accepting the proffered offer of a ride in a wheelchair to the security line, where he had his only moment of panic as the tall young man from the airline pushed him toward the TSA PreCheck area.
But his tails had been smart enough to anticipate this and had paid extra to be in the shorter line themselves.
When pre-boarding began, he tottered over to the bathroom, where he spent twelve minutes in a stall making a variety of noises designed to turn the stomachs of his pursuers, then spent another three minutes washing and drying his hands.
By the time he returned to the gate only a handful of people still waited to board.
One of his tails had apparently already gone down the jetway and the other went through the door as soon as he saw the president hold a boarding pass out to the gate agent.
Then it was a simple matter to whisper to the agent that he had the gates mixed up, sprint back down the concourse, and board his actual flight seconds before they closed the jetway door and before his tails could even make it back into the terminal.
He settled into the first-class seat he had purchased online that morning and smiled.
Pilgrim 3 had no idea who she was dealing with.